Gay China News & Reports 2010 Jun-Dec

Felix of Southeast Asia is finishing up his visit to Beijing, Here, he tells about the Beijing gay center, IDAHO in China, activism that brings about awareness in Beijing, and about an LGBT Christian cell group that meets in Beijing.

One of the highlights of my Beijing tour has been the LGBT center. I attended their program at the center on Saturday and Sunday. Saturday afternoon’s program was the launch of a gay novel written by openly gay author Xiaojie. I bought a copy for our GSMCC (Good Samaritan Metropolitan Community Church, Malaysia) library. Every Saturday night is movie night and that evening they screened the film "A Single Man," after which they had an interesting discussion of the film. Sunday they had the Secretary General of the International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia (IDAHO), Joel Bedos, to speak at the center.

I understand that Joel was in town upon the invitation of the French Embassy to do an IDAHO event at the French Cultural Center on Saturday, and so he was invited as a special guest at the LGBT center on Sunday. The director Xu Bin, a dedicated lesbian activist proficient in English, was present to interpret. After Joel’s presentation, Bin reported on the events and activities of LGBT groups marking IDAHO around China. Photos and video clips were shared on the screen against the backdrop of the rainbow drapes covering the glass window on the 21st floor of an apartment block. Here’s a synopsis of the events just to give you an idea of gay activism in China.

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June 2010 – Film Threat

2
Queer China, ‘Comrade’ China

No Current Star Rating
Year Released: 2010
MPAA Rating: Unrated
Running Time: 60 minutes

China was relatively late in openly acknowledging the basic civil rights of its homosexual population – it wasn’t until 1997 that the Communist government decriminalized “hooliganism,” as it was officially known. However, the acceptance of non-heterosexuals into a mainstream societal position has been complicated, although the resistance bears no resemblance to the religious-fueled homophobia that has become commonplace in the United States. Indeed, the film explains that same-sex unions are seen by many as a disruption of the yin-yang harmony within the Chinese mindframe and the disruption of the cohesive family unit that was stressed since Mao Zedong’s rise to power.

There is also the consideration by many of an unpleasant Western influence in pushing gay rights – or, at least, the Western version of the subject. Actually, the preferred word in China is not “gay” or “queer,” but “tongzhi” which means “comrade.” Still, progress has been sincere. As late as 2000, television programs with such awkward titles as “Approaching Gay People” were being used to address the subject. Today, predominantly gay and lesbian bars, publications, telephone hotlines and social organizations are commonplace in China’s major cities, and the subject of same-sex marriage has been politely debated within the government. Research has also determined relatively low levels of homophobia among the population, especially among those who favor a liberalization of China’s economy.

Yet problems persist and resistance can still be found, most notably in the abrupt closure of gay film festivals at Beijing University in 2001 and 2005 and problems in obtaining official permits for gay pride events. However, distinctively Chinese approaches to the subject – such as the encouragement of flying rainbow kites – shows that the hinges are very much off the closet door. The film includes a large number of scholars, activists, filmmakers and writers who speak frankly on the subject. If one can tolerate the film’s somewhat erratic style – with constantly switching between full-, split- and partial-screens plus a surplus of Chinese and English subtitling – there is a genuinely fascinating look at Chinese sociology in a state of continual evolution.

8 June 2010 – Fridae

3
Gay men and lesbians in China marry heterosexually to cover-up

by News Editor
Lesbians and gay men are tying the knot with a member of the opposite sex to satisfy their parents, reports China Daily. Some 90 percent of China’s homosexuals – estimated to number 39-52 million – are trapped in marriages with straight partners, state-run English language newspaper China Daily quoted prominent sociologist and sexologist Li Yinhe of the China Academy of Social Sciences as saying in a 2006 interview with Guangzhou Daily. She attributed the numbers to a lack of understanding of homosexuality and traditional mores that are forcing more gay men to marry, and even beget children.

The report also cited a 2005 survey of 200 gay men, by the Guangdong Center for Diseases Control and Prevention, that revealed that 30 percent of them were married [to women presumably since same-sex marriages are not legal in China]. A lesbian couple Zhang Nana, a 32-year-old working for a Beijing-based magazine, and Shenlan (not their real names), 29, who was profiled in the report both married gay men to placate all four parties’ parents. They began their search for a gay couple in 2005, setting two conditions for their prospective "husbands": no body contact and no children.

In October 2006, Zhang and her husband, a 31-year-old university lecturer surnamed Wang, threw a wedding banquet for more than 100 relatives and friends; her partner was a bridesmaid at her wedding. The following year her partner Shenlan married Wang’s boyfriend.

"My life has become an endless round of deceptions. I’m exhausted with all the lying. I have even had to abandon some of my cherished friendships," Shenlan says. "We thought a gay couple could help all four of us keep our long-term relationship," Zhang says. "But we were wrong." Zhang and Wang divorced three years into their marriage. She has not reconciled with her family since she come out to her parents after her divorce.

June 27, 2010 – The Miami Herald

4
Biggest obstacle for China’s gays: Social pressure for marriage

by Elizabeth Murphy, McClatchy Newspapers
Shanghai – They had what they thought was the perfect solution, but it turned out that the men are just too picky. They think that Yu Xiaofei, with her cropped black hair and dark-rimmed glasses, looks too much like a tomboy, and they think that Jiang Yifei’s distaste for children is suspicious. So what are these young Chinese women to do? They’re 24, out of college, employed, living at home – and they’re in love with each other and desperate to find a way to stay together.

"The most important thing is that we cannot hurt out parents," Yu said. "They put a lot on us." That means finding two men in a similar predicament. Their plan is simple. Yu and Jiang will find a gay male couple, arrange a living situation and lay down some ground rules. Then, they’ll pair off with the men and get married, just as their parents expect them to do. They still have time, and they’re using it to take in every last kiss and touch before these gestures become even more complicated than they already are. Still, their proposed arrangement is no grand tragedy for the pair – it’s practical.

Beneath it all are the Confucian family values that still underpin Chinese society: As a son or daughter, it’s your duty to maintain and carry on the family line by having children. "We have to – that’s tradition," said Jiang, who sports long caramel-colored hair and clinking bangle bracelets. "That’s what (our parents) think we should do."

Plans such as Yu’s and Jiang’s are viable in China, even in international cities such as Shanghai. Homosexuality was considered a mental illness until 2001, and gay sex was decriminalized only 13 years ago. The ramifications of China’s increasingly open gay culture are visible, but although it continues to grow, the traditional pressures and social stigma remain. While Shanghai hosted mainland China’s first ever Gay Pride event in June 2009 and is known for its booming gay nightlife, its lesbian and gay inhabitants still live in constant fear of a government crackdown.

"The gay movement is not very developed," said Wei Wei, a sociology professor at Shanghai’s East China Normal University. "The major issue facing them is not homophobia, it is social pressure for marriage." In fact, Wei estimates that about 90 percent of Chinese gays eventually will marry someone of the opposite sex. Still, lesbian and gay Shanghainese have carved out a place for themselves. On a typical Saturday, Yu works as a bartender at Red Station, a lesbian bar on the fourth floor of a tall office building.

Men prefer Shanghai Studio, which is in the basement of an apartment complex. Its bathroom sign reads, "PP ISLAND, FOR MEN ONLY," and the owners rent out a room to a male underwear store dubbed MANifesto. These young Chinese are using these years to live the way they please before the weight of marriage descends. Yu Jing, a 20-year-old student at Shanghai’s Tongji University, said she doesn’t identify as a "lala," or lesbian. She said she likes to date girls – she’s been in relationships with five women and no men.

Yu Jing’s parents found out about her most recent relationship a few months ago, prompting her to promise "to try to not date another girl." She broke up with her girlfriend a month later. "My dad said, ‘You are on a road that can go no further,’ " she recalled. "So I’ll marry a man one day so I do not disappoint my parents."

Full Story

30 June, 2010 – CNN

5
Selling ‘smiles:’ Inside the world of Shanghai’s male sex workers
CNNGo shadows NGO Shanghai Leyi’s volunteers as they reach out to help Shanghai’s male prostitutes

by Xing Zhao
In a quiet apartment complex in Hongkou, a high-rise building, much like any other, stretches skyward. Inside is one of Shanghai’s 60 or so gay ‘massage’ parlors, a temporary home for some of Shanghai’s male sex workers. This is one small part of China’s forgotten industry, a trade that many prefer did not exist, and so pretend it doesn’t. I am here with a team from Shanghai Leyi, an NGO that provides support to these sex workers plying their trade illegally and therefore with no recourse to official care, as it visits two such parlors.

“By ‘massage’, it often means outcall services: a website, a QQ number, and some mobile phones,” says Yu Tian, project coordinator at Shanghai Leyi. These are services the parlor provides to the sex workers, who use these to set up ‘dates’ with clients and to otherwise communicate. Most male sex workers — often called "money boys" — stay in one house for no more than three months. “They have to move on to another house when the patrons get tired [of them],” explains Yu Tian.

Inside the three-bedroom apartment, five solidly built men sit around smoking and looking at photos of half naked men flashing on a computer screen. These are workers during their down time. “We only give massages if clients require it,” says the boss of the house, Brother Y, with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth. “But normally, it’s RMB 500 for a quickie and RMB 600 for the night.” While he’s explaining his profession to me, Brother Y is also busy answering a client’s QQ messages on his mobile. Clearly a popular man.

The industry
Shanghai Leyi assists between 2,000 and 3,000 male sex workers per year, a tiny proportion of the total number of prostitutes in China, estimates for which vary between 1 million and 10 million. “We don’t tell them what’s right or wrong,” says Yu Tian. “We are only there to help solve the problems they have. For example, if someone’s got a STD, they’d call us and ask us where they can find help.” In China, the sex trade is metaphorically called “selling smiles” — a colloquial reference to how they make the people feel who visit them. Shanghai Leyi works to ensure everyone is safe too.

Inside a second, small two-bedroom house down the street from the first, three young men are each sitting in front of a computer playing video games as two guys run in and out of the kitchen cooking. Colorful underwear hangs around like national flags at the UN headquarters. Dirty water floods out of the bathroom through the half closed door. I sit on an old couch next to the Calvin Kleins and am handed some hot water in a plastic cup. “Are you a homosexual? I am!” says a young guy with longish hair, and he giggles like a drunken butterfly. The boss, a skinny man in his late 30s, is interviewing a new boy. “We only take RMB 100 for hooking you up, and the rest is all yours,” he says to the recruit. “All you need to do now is to get your photos up on our website.”

The lure of money
When asked why they chose such an occupation, the workers all say it’s for the money. “If it wasn’t for the money, who’d want to sleep with someone they don’t like?” asks one. Xiaodong, a 24 year-old from Shangdong, has just started working here, and believes that he’ll make RMB 20,000 per month, “if business is good.” Nonetheless, Yu Tian tells me some barely make RMB 2,000 per month, around the national average. Apart from safe sex and health care issues, Shanghai’s money boys also face on average twice-a-year police raids, according to Shanghai Leyi as well as extortion, violence and mental health concerns.

“Many of them have low self-esteem,” says Yu Tian. “They often feel very empty, so some turn to drugs and gambling.” All issues that show the challenges Shanghai Leyi faces. “We just want to create a better environment for sex workers,” says Zheng Huang, the founder of the NGO. “They’re still people, they have rights.”

July 1, 2010 – PinkNews

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Chinese gay man sues over blood donation ban

by Staff Writer, PinkNews.co.uk
A Chinese man is suing a Beijing Red Cross centre for refusing to accept his blood donation because he is gay. According to AFP, Wang Zizheng went to the centre in June to give blood and declared he was gay on a form. He was told that under Chinese health regulations, he could not donate blood because of his sexual orientation. Many countries ban gay and bisexual men from donating blood because of the risk of HIV.

Gay campaigners argue that would-be donors should be accepted on an individual basis which focuses on risky behaviour, rather than sexual orientation. China’s 1998 ban means anyone who states they are gay or lesbian on a blood donation form is automatically disqualified from donating. However, the is no penalty for lying on the forms. Mr Wang has filed a case against the centre for discrimination, China Daily reported. He was quoted as saying "for thousands of homosexuals in China, someone has to stand out" and added that he was seeking an apology from the centre.

He added: "I agree with having restrictions on homosexuals; it is just they have to be scientific." Mr Wang is waiting for his case to be accepted by a court. Last July, a lesbian group set up a campaign to be allowed to donate blood.

16 July 2010 – Fridae

7
UK Pavilion at Shanghai World Expo hosts LGBT meeting

by Shanghai Daily
Some 30 participants, both Chinese and expatriates, gathered at the UK Pavilion at the Shanghai World Expo at a LGBT meeting organised by the British Embassy in Beijing and the British Consulate-General Shanghai.

The Shanghai Daily reports on July 15, 2010:
The event was almost canceled due to pressure from some government departments. The very small online announcement was removed from several websites "just in case," one of the organizers said yesterday. Yet some 30 participants, both Chinese and expatriates, gathered in a grassy corner of the UK Pavilion at the Shanghai World Expo last night – mostly unnoticed in the semi-darkness – for a Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender get-together.

Core members from nearly 10 Shanghai-based LGBT organizations gathered outside the "Seed Cathedral" to chat about the progress and the future of LGBT communities in China. Though the numbers were small, the gathering was in the same spirit as the seventh Pride London Parade on July 3, which drew 1 million people, an organizer said. The participants appreciated efforts of the British Embassy in Beijing and the British Consulate-General Shanghai for organizing the event.

It is rare in China, where LGBT-related issues and events are still sensitive. "It just fits here, in the UK Pavilion, to show the amazing diversity and contributions of the LGBT community, which is a part of UK life," organizer Kathryn Rand from British Embassy told Shanghai Daily. It was the first LGBT event the embassy organized in Shanghai and second in China. The embassy held a similar gathering in Beijing on May 17 to mark International Day Against Homophobia.

2 August 2010 – Fridae

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Chinese Male Homosexualities: Memba, Tongzhi and Golden Boy

by Nigel Collett
Nigel Collett reviews Chinese Male Homosexualities: Memba, Tongzhi and Golden Boy by Travis S. K. Kong which explores masculinities and homosexualities amongst Chinese gay men, and provides a sociological account of masculinity, desire, sexuality, identity and citizenship in contemporary Chinese societies in Hong Kong, Mainland China and London.

It is good to be able to relate that we have seen a steady stream of academic books on Asian LGBT subjects emerging over the last two years. Admittedly, they are often not every one’s cup of tea, and are often far from easy reading; queer theory coupled with sociology can make for an indigestible verbal brew from which the gobbets of meaning have to be fished with long chop sticks! Cheap jibes aside, though, these are books by academics for other academics and have to conform to the formats, styles and protocols imposed by their disciplines, so the general reader must expect to be confronted with the occasional technical difficulty when opening their covers. You might ask, then, should the general reader be reading these books at all? It is a question, no doubt, of personal interest and taste, but my own answer is that it can be worth the effort. Academia stands back from the daily fray and from fashion and can give a fresh perspective and a deeper analysis which we get nowhere else. We may live in a society, but that does not mean we have a handle on all of its aspects, and if we want to understand our world, then, as Shakespeare’s nurse advises, we ‘must to the learned’. For the activists amongst us, academic analysis can produce frameworks and vocabulary that can organise and validate arguments. Academia also brings us news from abroad; cross-cultural or societal comparisons can help open local doors. My personal approach: to arm myself with a series of strong cups of coffee or a glass of wine or two and get stuck in when it’s too hot or wet to go out, skimming the theoretical bits and fishing for the nuggets they hide.

It was a pleasant surprise, then, to find that I devoured Travis Kong’s new book, Chinese Male Homosexualities, in just a couple of sittings. In the majority of the book where Kong lets go the chains of academic sado-masochism, he writes lucidly, fluently and, at times, even amusingly. In fact, his new book is an excellent exemplar of the contrasts in the way his area of study is written, not only due to its own structure, but also because it is a very good introduction to the theory of the subject.

Chapter 1 sketches very neatly the history of the field, both in and about the west, then later in Asia; from the sexologists of the early part of the twentieth century, through psychiatry to the sociology of deviance in the ‘60s, the (constructionist) sociology of homosexuality of the ‘80s, on to the post-structuralist/deconstructivist ‘Foucauldian Deluge’ of the ‘80s to ‘90s then to the (postmodernist) queer academic theory of the ‘90s, which is about where we are at present. If that is not enough to take your breath away, Kong throws in anthropological developments, postcolonialism and the rise of the postcolonial queer theorists of the present day, who, despite this deluge of ‘isms and ‘ologies, have come up with the remarkably simple and attractive idea that everyone is different due to the local circumstances pertaining everywhere, that everyone has a different idea of what kind of ‘sexual citizen’ they want to be, and that therefore everybody is as equally worthy of study as anyone else. Kong tacks on here a very useful historiography of writing about Chinese homosexualities. If nothing else, this book will long be a handy crib for generations of university undergrads.

The meat of Kong’s study, one which has taken him well over a decade (he began interviews for it in 1997), is an investigation of the plight of gay men in three places: Hong Kong, London and Mainland China (where he conducted interviews in the major cities of Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou – as well as some in other places in Guangdong province). In Hong Kong, Kong meets activists (and again he gives a very useful potted history of Hong Kong activism up to about 2000) from many of the Hong Kong LGBT groups (amongst whom, by the way, he is well known as one of the principal academic supporters of their fight for gay rights). He approves (he cannot help but let slip in this study his personal preference for radical assaults on the established status quo) their refusal to accept the marginalisation of their own more marginal communities (such as transgender, bisexual etc), albeit they may be seen by the majority, straight or gay, as transgressive (male prostitutes, for instance). He examines the way he believes the struggle for gay citizenship has been sublimated in the arts; once again, his book is a very useful guide for a student of gay culture in Hong Kong.

Read Entire Review Here

16 August 2010 – Fridae

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Hello comrade! Campaign to bridge China’s mainstream society and LGBTs

by Dinah Gardner
Organisers received thousands of photos and messages of encouragement to Chinese gays and lesbians from members of the public in all corners of China. A human smile can you make you feel warm and happy, it may make you laugh, and it certainly goes a long way to making someone feel welcome. Someone’s smile shows their approval. It shows they like you. It was all of these emotions, all of these these feelings that Eric Hou, a 23-year-old fresh graduate from the northeastern city of Changcun, wanted to give China’s gay community. He wanted to capture smiles from straight people on camera and send them to the Chinese gay world.

“I want to be a bridge between China’s mainstream society and LGBTs,” he said. “Smiles usually represent kind and good intentions. This is something that our gay friends most hope for.” So on May 20, Hou launched his Smile for Gay project, China’s first national gay outreach campaign. In Chinese, it was called Tongzhi Nihao meaning hello comrade! Comrade is a commonly used term to mean homosexual. With very little resources, he used two popular mainstream websites (Douban.com and Sina.com) and asked straight netizens to upload photos of themselves smiling with a message of encouragement to Chinese gays and lesbians. At the same time he sent bands of volunteers across the country to ask passersby in the street if they’d join. More than 600 volunteers from all corners of the country – including Hong Kong, Yunnan, Inner Mongolia, Sichuan, Guangdong, Beijing, Shanghai and the northeastern region – took to the streets with cameras, whiteboards, badges, leaflets about gay society and of course their own smiles.

The result was amazing. After a little under two months he collected 4,409 photos. “In the beginning I was only hoping for 1,000,” he said.

Left to right: "Human rights, freedom to love," "Forget ‘he’ is ‘her’" and "There’s no rainbow without a storm."

And what a collection it is. Young and old, male and female, people from all walks of life. There are boyfriends and girlfriends, newly-wedded couples and mothers and fathers. One photo shows a middle-aged man in migrant worker clothing. His sign says: “I wish you happiness.” There’s another of a monk, grinning, hold a whiteboard with the words jia you (go for it!).

A handsome Tibetan man, who apparently deliberated for 20 minutes before agreeing to take part, holds up his sign with the words in Tibetan script and Chinese saying “Love is the most beautiful law.”

Snapped on her webcam, one girl poses in the nude (modestly cropped), others write words of encouragement on their body. Things got creative. But perhaps the most arresting of them all was the photo of an old man painting calligraphy with a giant brush near a lake in central Beijing. One of the volunteer teams had asked him if he would take part in their “Tongzhi Nihao” campaign. The old man wasn’t familiar with slang. He thought comrade meant comrade. “Is this something to do with the Red Army?” he asked. After the volunteers explained, he was happy to join the campaign and proceeded to paint the characters jia you tongzhi (Go for it! Gay people!) on the pavement.

Most messages expressed simple support “Our love is the same,” or jia you (go for it!). But there were also more bizarre notes such as: “Go to Denmark and get married,” and “Love is not physics, fixed rules are farts!”

The campaign’s success reflects not only the growing sense of understanding and tolerance towards the gay community in China (largely among the younger generation) but it is also a factor of how the campaign was designed. It’s non-confrontational, the online component is entirely voluntary while on the street volunteers were told to politely back down if passersby were not supportive or expressed homophobic opinions. It’s friendly: who can resist someone asking for your smile? And it’s homegrown: all the volunteers were local Chinese (and according to Hou, about 70% were straight). In this way, it’s much more accommodating to Chinese culture than flamboyant Prides or angry demonstrations could ever be. Beijing police closed down a Mr Gay China beauty pageant in January, while last year Shanghai’s first gay Pride had to cancel some events.

Tongzhi Nihao / Smile for Gay organiser Eric Hou

Hou looks like an unlikely candidate to be an activist, especially in a country like China whose one-party state doesn’t generally tolerate protests. He is short, slight and softly spoken. But at 23, Hou is a veteran activist. When he was just a first-year-student at Chungchun Normal University, four years ago, he founded the Changchun Animal Protection Association. They campaigned against cruelty to pets. Hou organized students to take part in several street protests against the eating of dog and cat meat where they took to the streets waving bloody posters of slaughtered pets and climbed into cages wearing animal masks.

“Five terms can describe who I am,” says Hou. “Buddhist, vegetarian, animal rights, liberalism, and non-violence. My motto: ‘Love and be cool!’” As the project picked up momentum, it was easier to collect photos, says Hou. Once people could see that so many other people had joined us they were much more willing to also take part. “There weren’t many people that openly and directly opposed us. Those that did were mostly middle- and old-aged,” he adds. One of the more blunt rejections came from a foreigner in Nanning who ripped up the leaflets the Smile for Gay volunteers had given him. He shouted: “It’s not natural.”

Of course, there is still a lot of ignorance and homophobia in China. It wasn’t until 2001 that homosexuality was removed from the list of mental diseases and the older generation still remembers the time when being gay was equated with hooliganism. But increasing positive coverage of gay issues in China is changing opinions says Xian, founder of lesbian help group, Common Language. “It’s a slow steady process, but attitudes to gays have improved a lot especially in the last five years,” she says. “And I think it’s mainly because media is now reporting gay issues, and there are more freedoms on the Internet and these are changing people’s attitudes.”

There was one thing Hou regretted. “Well, when I got the photo of the Buddhist monk, I tweeted calling for representatives of the other religions – Christianity, Islam – to send in a photo too but we never got any.” There’s still time. All the photos in this project can be seen on the Tongzhi Nihao / Smile for Gay website. If you are in Beijing, an exhibition of some of the best photos is being exhibited at the Beijing LGBT Centre until 1 September (open weekends to the public).

28 September 2010 – Fridae

10
Dozens of gay men detained in Beijing

by News Editor
Dozens or even hundreds of gay men who had gathered at an outdoor pick-up spot in Beijing on Sunday night were rounded up and detained briefly in a major police swoop, according to media reports.

State-run People’s Daily Online reported on Sep 28, 2010:
Hundreds of gay men have been rounded up and taken away in an ongoing police operation at Mudanyuan in Haidian district, Beijing. About 20 police vehicles carrying four officers each including SWAT teams invaded the outdoor gay hangout Sunday night. Police hit the area again late last night.

"You can’t imagine how deeply over 200 of us were wounded by this experience," one of the arrested gay men told the Global Times Monday on condition of anonymity. He refused to discuss details of his treatment by the police. They were taken to the Huayuanlu police station, revealed an online post on a website popular with Mudanyuan visitors. "They were required to show their identity cards, take a blood test, have their photo taken and leave their fingerprints."

The campaign was just part of the typical annual citywide public security inspection ahead of the National Day holiday, said Beijing Public Security Bureau spokesman Zi Xiangdong. He did not elaborate what regulations had been violated by the seized men.

AFP via Yahoo News:
Officers and riot police descended on Mudanyuan, a forested area in northern Beijing that is the capital’s largest gay pick-up spot, late Sunday and Monday, said Guo Ziyang, a project manager at the Beijing Gay Working Group. "According to those who were there, riot and normal police detained more than 80 people on Sunday, made them register and took photos, and then they let them go," Guo, whose organisation campaigns for gay rights, told AFP.

October 8, 2010 – The New York Times

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Nobel Peace Prize Given to Jailed Chinese Dissident

by Andrew Jacobs and Jonathan Ansfield
Beijing — Liu Xiaobo, an impassioned literary critic, political essayist and democracy advocate repeatedly jailed by the Chinese government for his activism, has won the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize in recognition of “his long and non-violent struggle for fundamental human rights in China.” Mr. Liu, 54, perhaps China’s best known dissident, is serving an 11-year term on subversion charges, in a cell 300 miles from Beijing. He is one of three people to have received the prize while incarcerated by their own governments, after the Burmese opposition leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, in 1991, and the German pacifist, Carl von Ossietzky, in 1935.

By awarding the prize to Mr. Liu, the Norwegian Nobel Committee has provided an unmistakable rebuke to Beijing’s authoritarian leaders at a time of growing intolerance for domestic dissent and a spreading unease internationally over the muscular diplomacy that has accompanied China’s economic rise. In a move that in retrospect appears to have been counterproductive, a senior Chinese official had warned the Norwegian committee’s secretary that giving the prize to Mr. Liu would adversely affect relations between the two countries. The committee, in announcing the prize Friday, noted that China, the world’s second biggest economy, should be commended for lifting hundreds of millions of people out of poverty.

But it chastised the government for ignoring basic rights guaranteed by the Chinese Constitution and in the international conventions to which Beijing is a party. “In practice, these freedoms have proved to be distinctly curtailed for China’s citizens,” committee members said, adding, “China’s new status must entail increased responsibility.”

The Chinese Foreign Ministry reacted angrily to the news, calling it a “desecration” of the Peace Prize and saying it would harm Norwegian-Chinese relations. The Chinese government summoned Norway’s ambassador to protest the award, a spokesman for the Norwegian Foreign Ministry told reporters. “The Nobel Committee giving the Peace Prize to such a person runs completely contrary to the aims of the prize,” Ma Zhaoxu, a spokesman said in a statement posted on the ministry’s Web site. “Liu Xiaobo is a criminal who has been sentenced by Chinese judicial departments for violating Chinese law.”

Headlines about the award were nowhere to be found in the Chinese-language state media or on the country’s main Internet portals. Broadcasts about Liu Xiaobo (pronounced Liew Show Boh) on CNN, which reach only luxury compounds and hotels in China, were blacked out throughout the evening. Many mobile phone users reported not being able to transmit text messages containing his name in Chinese. But on government-monitored microblogs like Sina.com, which regularly blocks searches for his name, the news still generated nearly 6,000 comments within an hour of the announcement.

The announcement also energized international calls for Mr. Liu’s release, including one from President Obama, who urged China to free him “as soon as possible,” saying that political reforms in China had not kept pace with its economic growth. Given that he has no access to a telephone, it was unlikely that Mr. Liu would immediately learn of the news, his wife, Liu Xia, said. On Friday night, dozens of foreign reporters gathered outside the couple’s building in Beijing but they were prevented from entering by the police, who posted a sign saying the complex residents “politely refused” to be interviewed. His wife was also barred from leaving her apartment.

Given his imprisonment, Mr. Liu is not expected to accept the prize in person. The award includes a gold medal, a diploma and the equivalent of $1.5 million dollars.

Read Article

October 10, 2010 – OnTop Magazine

12
Shanghai Returns With China’s Second Gay Pride Celebration

by On Top Magazine Staff
Mainland China’s first large-scale Gay Pride celebration, Shanghai Pride, had a shaky debut last year, but this year organizers promise a bigger and longer festival. Several of last year’s events were canceled at the prompting of officials. A screening of the lesbian-themed film Lost in You and a staging of The Laramie Project were forced to close. The play reconstructs the gruesome 1998 murder of Matthew Shepard, the University of Wyoming student beaten, shackled to a post and left to die in a field by two men he had met in a gay bar. Other events – art exhibits, food events and panel discussions – went off without a hitch.

This year’s celebration has been moved from June to October and will take place over 3 weeks. The festival gets started on October 16 with its official party. Added this year is a queer film festival that will take place over 5 days. Twenty-eight-year-old Shanghai Pride spokesman Kenneth Tan told Time Out Shanghai that the Internet has fostered the burgeoning gay community in conservative China.

“Pride took so long to get here because everyone was still in the closet, but the Internet has changed all of that,” he said. “A certain ‘ecosystem’ has to develop before the elements are in place for Pride to happen. This process took a while here in China.”

October 10, 2010 – OnTop Magazine

12
Shanghai Returns With China’s Second Gay Pride Celebration

November 09 2010 – The Global Times

13
Tears, jokes & heartacheBy Lin Meilian

Most of the afternoon, the gray-haired mother bows her head, listening intently to the speakers. Then her husband stands up and tells the meeting their story: how he took their son from their home in Hebei Province to a Tianjin therapist 10 years ago to "cure" him of his homosexuality. Only after treatment – not before – did their son really begin to exhibit serious mental problems. Now, at last, she stands. "We understand his homosexuality can’t be changed," says the 70-something woman. "We should never have done that to him…" She explodes into tears and weeps uncontrollably.

Until 2001, homosexuality was still classified as a mental illness in China. Zhang Beichuan, a professor at Qingdao University and an expert on homosexuality and HIV/AIDS prevention, estimated the real number of gay people in China as 30 million. "But the number of parents who accept their children as gay is far, far smaller," says Wu Youjian, 63, mother of a gay son and founder of Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) China. Eleven people attended her first PFLAG meeting in Guangzhou, capital of Guangdong Province last year.

Today about 100 people including experts, gay men, lesbians and their parents from China, Canada and the US gather in Beijing for the third Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) China meeting. For many, this will be their first time talking publicly about something so extremely personal. His mother also took him to see a psychiatrist, says Nelson Chen, 39, founder of the Gay & Lesbian Political Caucus in Taiwan.

"My mom told the psychiatrist that I had some ‘problems’ such as going to a gay bar and having gay friends," he says, "but the psychiatrist didn’t seem surprised. "He said calmly to my mom ‘Madam, you are the one who needs a psychiatrist. Since then, I have recommended all my gay friends’ parents see that psychiatrist!" The crowd laughs.

Many Chinese mainland psychiatrists still subscribe to the old, lucrative opinion that sexual orientation is a matter of choice. "If he’s willing to change," says Zhou Zhengyou, director of the Nanjing Psychological Consultation Center, "I believe therapy will not harm him." The word "therapy" is not playing well with the audience in this hotel conference room. "It’s like this: You’re watching gay porn, feeling good … suddenly they stuff ammonia into your nose," a man whispers to his friend. They titter.

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24 December 2010 – MSM Global Forum
(Chinese to English translation)

14
On the Status of LGBT Student Groups at Sichuan Universities and High Schools

"Although homosexuality in our schools have not set a precedent be registered student organizations, but we still inclusive schools, but also allows us to exist ", which is Sichuan University gay student group "Homoscu" one of the three organizers, 21-year-old Students Hu Jun (transliteration) "Global Times"describes the situation. December 24 in English, "Global Times " reported in Chengdu, Sichuan University and other colleges and universities the status of gay student organizations.

Last week, "Homoscu" ushered in the seventh anniversary of the Day, Hu Jun is also involved in organizing the celebration, but for him, but felt bittersweet. "Homoscu" already exists in seven years, currently has 300 members, but not allowed to officially registered in the school. In this case, "Homoscu" can not open recruitment of members, can not be the same as other student clubs the school funding. Hu Jun said, "Homoscu" The purpose is to help gay students to get to know each other friends, to carry out AIDS prevention education to help gay students and help ease the pressure to reduce discrimination. Woo said: "We are no different with others, in addition to sexual orientation."

Gay China News & Reports 2010 Jun-Dec

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